“AS POOR, BUT ENRICHING MANY”

W. Dickson

2 Corinthians 8: 9; 6: 10 (“as poor, but enriching many”); 1 Corinthians 3: 19–23; Luke 21: 1–4; Ecclesiastes 9: 13–18

In each of these scriptures, implied or actually said, there is a reference to a poor person—poor, but wealthy. The wealth that these persons had was given to them. Leaving aside for the moment the scripture that relates personally to the Lord Jesus (2 Corinthians 8: 9), the wealth was given to them by God.

This scripture in 2 Corinthians 8 is, at all times, calculated to touch our affections. The apostle in his undoubted levitical skill, in dealing with this matter of the collections at Corinth, would take account of the known wealth of the city, which no doubt had its reflection amongst the saints. The Corinthians failed to act as God would have had them act in ministering to the needs of the saints so Paul brings in this choice touch as to the Lord Jesus. He does not say, ‘I am going to tell you about the grace of the Lord Jesus’, he did not say that; he says, “For ye know”, you know it. Beloved brethren, many here, I am sure, young and old alike, know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ. These precious links that were formed with Him when we first felt the touch of His grace upon our hearts, youthful as we may have been, wayward in our thoughts—if not in our steps—these wondrous touches ever remain from the time when Jesus affected us by His grace.

He says, “For ye know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that for your sakes he, being rich

...”.

Now the question was raised in our conversations household-wise as to what extent the word

‘mystery’ is applicable at the present time. May I venture to suggest, beloved brethren, that to attempt to intrude into the depth of meaning that is in that word “He, being rich” may be seeking an entry into what is mysterious. “He, being rich”. What could it mean, beloved?

What could the expression mean in regard of the Person of Jesus, that He was rich? Let us ponder it; let us think of it with holy wonder and feelings; what could it mean that He was rich? Perhaps it could refer to His place there in the Deity, in that glorious equality with the other Persons in the Godhead. It could refer to the heavenly beings as they surrounded Him and gave Him His rightful praise. But we leave it at that, just touched by a spirit of wonder that “He, being rich, became poor”.

Now, beloved brethren, Jesus became poor. That is not said of anybody else, that they became poor, in the context of the Scriptures. It was His own act; He became poor. And that does not refer just to the fact that He was born in Bethlehem, that He was cradled in a manger, that His parents were humble and obscure, and that His upbringing was, shall I say, of the most simple; I think it has a wider reference than these circumstances. It involves what He came into here in manhood, identifying Himself personally with every circumstance in which man was—in his need and distance from God—He took that way. It would be Luke’s gospel, would it not? It would be that wonderful treasury we have been speaking about.

Luke’s gospel—Oh, think of it! How our hearts should ever ponder that wondrous grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that He became poor “in order that ye by his poverty might be enriched”.

How enriched we have been. Do we ever go

over our riches, beloved brethren? Have you ever endeavoured to take an inventory of your spiritual wealth? At the time when you were too tired to read, too burdened to pray any more, too weary to visit the saints, and you thought everything was going to collapse around you—

have you sat down and written out an inventory of your spiritual wealth? Oh, how many continuation sheets you would need! Nothing we have, beloved brethren, is, of our own merit. Nothing we have is ours on account of anything we have done to earn it and secure it.

The blessed Saviour, He went to the cross, opened the floodgates of divine love in all their powerful flow, and reached us and the Father has “blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenlies in Christ”.

So Paul knew something about this when he said, “as poor, but enriching many”, 2

Corinthians 6: 10. That is the last reading that we had today, “as poor, but enriching many”.

Those four lepers in 2 Kings 7 were poor, but they enriched many. Think of a young believer, a young Christian, going to the office, and in a poverty-stricken atmosphere enriching persons, just telling them about the Lord, telling them about the Saviour, bringing in the wealth of the dispensation of grace and thus enriching many. Think of Paul and Silas in the prison at Philippi, poor, but enriching many, pouring the wealth of divine grace into that darkened prison. Who was the poorest person there? The jailor, he was the poorest person there. Paul and Silas, perhaps their very clothes were in tatters, yet “poor, but enriching many”.

There was Paul before Agrippa in all his splendour. No doubt he would look at Paul and would say, ‘Who is this poor man here? Who is he?’. It was Paul, a depositary of divine wealth, standing there in front of him. Who was rich? Who was poor there? Paul wrote to Galatia, that poverty-

stricken area, bound in the trammels of legality. Oh, there is nothing so poor as legality.

There they were in Galatia, poor, and what does he do? He pours in the wealth; he enriches them. “God has sent out the Spirit of his Son into our hearts” (Galatians 4: 6), he wrote. He brings forth the glory of the dispensation, the great thought of sonship. When Paul says, “as poor, but enriching many”, he was speaking, as he had right to speak, in some degree of his own service to many assemblies.

In 1 Corinthians 3 (and I want to link this scripture with Ecclesiastes), there were great bulwarks being built against Corinth. Corinth was a besieged city, and there was the poor wise man—Paul—there. And he says, “the wisdom of this world is foolishness with God”.

They traded in it at Corinth; they traded in the wisdom of this world. But Paul said it is foolishness; then “He who takes the wise in their craftiness”, and again, “The Lord knows the reasonings of the wise that they are vain”. The Lord knows. In assembly matters you have to have confidence in the Lord. You must have a conscious inward sense that the Lord knows the reasonings of the hearts of men. That is very strengthening. He proceeds, “So that let no one boast in men”. He put his finger right where the source of the trouble lay. He wrote, “Let no one boast in men”. May we be preserved from it, beloved brethren. May the experiences of these years, that have left an almost irreparable scar on the face of the recovery, be not lost on the brethren. Let us cling steadfastly and without deviation to the Leader of our salvation, and cling to His headship and His power.

Paul then proceeds, “For all things are yours. Whether Paul, or Apollos, or Cephas”; Paul did not belong to any party. Apollos did not belong to any party. Cephas was not the figurehead of any party.

“All are yours”. Every gift in the assembly is ours. Everyone who has brought wealth and substance and direction in regard to the truth belongs to the saints. And he says, “or the world”—think of that—“or the world, or life, or death”, they are all yours. What world is he speaking about? There is another world, do you know it? Do you know a world that is yours?

Many here know it, a world that is theirs, but it is not this world. It may be a reference to this world, I do not know; but many know another world and Christ is the centre of it. And death—yes, that is ours also. Oh, is it yours? Death is a most powerful possession to have in spiritual life. Did you know that? Death is a most powerful possession of the Christian. How many persons have been lost to the testimony because they were not prepared to die.

“Things present, or things coming”—what a range!—he says, “all are yours”. Ah! but notice this now, look at the scripture, beloved—“Ye are Christ’s”. He did not say, ‘And Christ is yours’. He did not say that. You would have thought he would have risen to the grand climax of his thoughts and said, ‘And Christ is yours’, but he did not say that. He says, “Ye are Christ’s, and Christ is God’s”. Thank God for that! That blessed Man is our link with God, but in all His glory, all His greatness. He is God’s and is for God. It was for God’s service and God’s praise that the work of redemption was done. It was done for God. What did these Corinthians think when they read that letter? We hope, we trust, that they sat down and said,

‘How small we have been! How poverty-stricken and lacking in wealth we have been! We have all that wealth, all that divine giving; it all belongs to us and we did not understand it or appreciate it, and we used these men—Paul, Apollos and Cephas, and leaders in Corinth (1

Corinthians 3: 4–6) as party leaders, overlooking the great and

outstanding value of the apostles as ministers of the assembly’.

So in Ecclesiastes 9, “There was a little city, and few men within it; and there came a great king against it, and encompassed it, and built great bulwarks against it”. That was Corinth.

God had said, “I have much people in this city” (Acts 18: 10), and Paul’s service had established a local assembly in that place. The great feature of the local assembly was to stand out in all its distinctiveness in the dispensation of the Spirit. The enemy saw that, there was something being established in the way of a garrison in every local place that would mean the overthrow of his order of things, and he built great bulwarks against that city. That was Corinth. The immorality, these party schisms, that belittling of Paul—these were the bulwarks that the enemy reared against that city. But, “there was found in it a poor wise man, who by his wisdom delivered the city”.

Beloved brethren, is there a poor wise man available today? Is there one? Do you ever pray for that, that the Lord will raise up, in His grace, a poor wise man who will deliver any city from the attack that may be made upon it? Part of the wisdom that the poor man used was that powerful thing that he possessed—death. Death to the flesh, death to the first order of man, death to the proud will of man. Do you remember what was said in regard to the two pillars that Samson brought down in the house of the Philistines? You older brethren, do you remember? Samson took hold of these two pillars, the mind of man and the will of man, and bowed himself with all his might. He said, “Lord ... strengthen me ... this once”, Judges 16: 28. These two pillars, the mind of man and the will of man, these Philistine features, he brought them down, but at the cost of his life.

It follows, “no man remembered that poor man”. Have we forgotten Him? We rightly use this scripture at times in relation to the Lord Jesus. Young people, here are you remembering the poor wise Man? Will you all break bread tomorrow? or are you amongst those who are not going to remember Him? So it says, “Wisdom is better than strength; but the poor man’s wisdom is despised, and his words are not heard. The words of the wise are heard in quiet more than the cry of him that ruleth among fools”, Ecclesiastes 9: 16, 17.

Now, where do you hear the words of the wise? You will hear them in the presence of God, that is where you will hear them. You will not get them in social conversation with the brethren, discussing this, discussing that, discussing the next thing; you will not get them that way. The question would be if you ever get them that way. If you want direction, if you want guidance, if you want your feet to be kept in the path of the will of God, get into the presence of God and hear the words of the wise. “Wisdom is better than weapons of war; but one sinner destroyeth much good”, Ecclesiastes 9: 18. May none be guilty of destroying what is good, whether it be little or much.

There is another reference to a besieged city, and I would just like to turn to it. Deuteronomy 20: 19—“When thou shalt besiege a city many days, in making war against it to take it, thou shalt not destroy the trees thereof by lifting up an axe against them; for thou canst eat of them; and thou shalt not cut them down, for is the tree of the field a man that it should be besieged? Only the trees which thou knowest are not trees for meat, thou mayest destroy and—cut them down, and build bulwarks against the city that maketh war with thee, until it fall”. Paul and Apollos and Cephas, they were the great fruit-bearing trees, and it says

in the note, ‘not cut them down (for the tree of the field is man’s life)’.

Do we know, beloved brethren, that the gifts that the Lord has given in the assembly are for our life—man’s life? The scripture warns us not to cut down the tree that bears fruit. It is a warning. It is that your life lies in the tree that bears fruit, Ephesians 4—the gifts from the ascended Head, the self-building up in love of the body. Oh, how many fruitful trees one has seen cut down and turned into weapons of war! That is what they were doing at Corinth, cutting down these fruitful trees and making them weapons of war. But in verse 20 the reference is to the tree that does not bear fruit, you can cut that down. Cut down the pride of human intellect, cut down the glory of man; cut down all these things, these trees do not bring fruit.

But the tree that bears fruit—those three lovely trees in Jotham’s parable—you would not cut down those trees. You would not cut down the trees that Jotham described so prophetically, but you would cut down that thorn-bush that would rule over the trees. Oh, that tree that does not bear fruit, the tree that wants to rule over the brethren; cut it down! Cut down that kind of thing, dealing in self-judgment with it in ourselves. We want to preserve everything that is good, everything that can help the brethren, everything that can strengthen the work of God, in order to extend the richness of the divine system as it operates amongst us by the Spirit.

In Luke 21 we find this woman. “He looked up and saw the, rich casting their gifts into the treasury; but he saw also a certain poor with casting therein two mites”. Can I refer back to the reading yesterday morning, when the question

came up about the assembly? if somebody said to you (this is prompted by a remark a brother made), ‘What is the assembly?’ what would you say? Well, one has given a little thought to it, and (as briefly as possible) the answer would be that the assembly is God’s dwelling place here upon earth. That is what the assembly is. That would really make a difference to us if we thought more of the assembly as God’s dwelling place on earth.

This woman was a certain poor widow casting in her two mites. What are the two mites? She is like David here in her royalty, “the house of my God”, 1 Chronicles 29: 3. One mite was what was prepared in her affection, and the other mite what was prepared in her affliction.

This poor widow gave of her own property. A widow, that was her own property. It was the experience that she had passed through that made available these two mites.

Oh, brethren, do the widows amongst us mean anything to you? Do they mean anything to you spiritually? Do they mean anything to you in any sense, the widows amongst us? Do you think of the wealth that the Lord is securing in the widowed sisters in our time? The Lord said, “This poor widow has cast in more than all; for all these out of their abundance have cast into the gifts of God; but she out of her need has cast in all the living which she had”.

How wealthy she was! Do you think she lost by giving it? No, she did not lose. She has her place in divine favour for she considered for God’s dwelling place down, here. Young people, on that high level commit yourself, devote yourself to the assembly as God’s dwelling-place here upon earth, for His name’s sake.

Address at Buckhurst Hill
1 January 1983.